Girl In The Mirror
by sauntervaguelydownwards
Summary: rated T to be safe. Small Cutler centric fic. May be continued later.
1. Chapter 1

Nick Cutler has a problem.

And nobody else can see her.

_You're in my head_ he spits the words into the thin air the girl invades and perverts with her image. She's short and stout, with a head full of dirty blonde ringlets falling just past her chin. Her neck is bleeding but no blood hits the floor. Her pink party dress is stained red in patches, a vicious reminder of the night she died.

_I killed you. _ He has his head in his hands now, looking anywhere but at the girl.

_You turned me_ the hallucination corrects, rolling her dead eyes in accusation. _ You were lonely and you were bored. You turned me then ran away when you realised what you'd done_.

Cutler doesn't speak. He looks up at the girl – Rebecca, her name was Rebecca – with a silent apology written on his face. She stares back without expression.

_Why are you here? Why now? Why you_? His voice cuts the air in the room. It breaks and catches and each word feels like forcing broken glass out of his throat. Rebecca crouches down in front of his slouched form in the corner of the room. A dirt stained hand reaches out to him and he flinches.

_I can help_ she says. Her voice is rough with disuse and the cigarettes she would smoke when out with her friends. _Find me, and I can help_.

_Why would you help me? _Cutler is uncomfortable in the cage she forms around him, but his legs do not move. Can not move.

_You're not the only lonely vampire in the world Nick._

Cutler blinks once – twice – three times until his eyes sting and his head burns. Rebecca pulls her hand across his face, the ghost of her fingertips standing his hair on end. She comes close until her lips brush the skin by his ear.

_I'm waiting for you...come back to where you last saw me...come back to where you killed me and I will hand you Hal Yorke's head on a platter made of bone. I promise you._

Her hand covers his face, obscuring his view and then – she's gone.

And Nick Cutler is alone once again, staring at the empty space where his reflection once was.


	2. Chapter 2

The voice on the intercom sounds familiar.

_Rebecca. Let me up Rebecca..._

Rebecca Gordon pulls herself from her position slumped on the floor, using the counter top for leverage. She stumbles a bit as the blood – secondhand or otherwise – rushes around her body. Muttering to herself she grabs the receiver from the wall.

"Who's this?" she demands, her voice hoarse and hungover.

"Nick Cutler" a familiar voice drifts through the receiver down to her stomach and settling like ice. She knows that name. She hates it.

"Fuck off." she spits and slams the receiver down. _Nick Cutler_ she thinks, _Nick fucking Cutler!_ She hasn't seen him since...since 1994? _What does he want from me?_

A pounding on the door shakes Rebecca from her panicked musings, followed by a harsh and desperate "Rebecca!".

She crosses to the door, as quietly as she can, she takes as long as possible sliding every chain across and opening the door as little as possible. It wont stop him if he decides to come in, but security was a nice illusion sometimes.

"What?" she hisses, with a loathing stare hopefully masking her fear. This was the man – the monster – who stole her life. No amount of hate will take that fear away.

"I need to speak to you," he's smiling, obviously excited about something and the ice in her stomach just gets worse.

"I don't want to speak to you," she spits back, silently pleading that her voice won't shake. She moves to close the door in his face but he wedges his foot so she can't. "How did you even get in here?" she asks. She didn't invite him in.

"Told a lovely little old lady I was your ex boyfriend hoping to patch things up, and she let me straight in. I also covered my back for if you started screaming at me." He looks pleased with himself.

"I'm not letting you in here." she pushes herself against the door, ready to throw her weight against it and shut the door on his foot. Instead he just bares his teeth and carries on pushing his weight against the door. Slowly the chain begins to separate before snapping and swinging the door open. Cutler is unchanged from the night she saw him last, only better dressed in a black suit with the first few buttons undone. He smiles dangerously, and steps forward across the threshold. Now inside the flat, he closes the door behind him, locking it again. Cutler is looking rather proud of himself now.

"Didn't know if that would work," he whispers conspiratorially through a lopsided smile. "Figured since your dead and all, you wouldn't have to invite me in. It worked on Buffy I think. Might have got a bit sticky for me if it hadn't though."

"I always wondered," Rebecca murmured. "What would happen if you walked into somewhere uninvited."

"I'd supposed there's fire involved. And melting maybe." Cutler shakes his head as if to clear the tangent they've settled into. "Back to business."

"I still don't want anything to do with you." She warns. "I don't care if you can just walk into my house. I can leave." and with that she pushes past him and towards the door, but he catches her around the waist before she could pass.

"And I can follow." He snarls before releasing her. "I have travelled a long way to talk to you, and it's your fault anyway so you are going to sit down and shut up!"

Rebecca stalks to her fridge, pulling out a bottle of whiskey and taking a deep swig. She sets it aside and reaches in again, carelessly throwing a plastic water bottle of blood in the direction of Cutler. "I don't keep crystal in student digs." She bites out at his insulted look. "What do you want?"

"You appeared to me. In a...I don't even know what. You said that you would hand me Hal Yorke's head on a platter of bone." Cutler slouches down on the beanbag, drinking messily from the bottle of blood.

"...Who?"


End file.
